Comparative analysis of the image of Onegin and Pechorin. Comparative characteristics of Onegin and Pechorin

03.11.2019

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Eugene Onegin and Pechorin are the heroes of different works of two famous classics of Russian literature - Pushkin and Lermontov. The first worked on the novel for more than seven years. Pushkin himself called his work "a feat" - of all his works, only "Boris Godunov" was awarded such an epithet. Lermontov's famous novel "A Hero of Our Time" was written within two years and first published in St. Petersburg. Further, the article will compare Onegin and Pechorin, showing the features that connect and distinguish them.

Pushkin's work. Short description

Alexander Sergeevich began work on the novel in Chisinau, in 1823. Pushkin was in exile at that time. In the course of the story, you can see that the author refused to use romanticism as the main creative method.

"Eugene Onegin" - a realistic novel in verse. It was assumed that initially the work will include 9 chapters. However, Pushkin subsequently reworked the structure of the novel somewhat, leaving only eight in it. The chapter about the protagonist's journey was excluded - it became an appendix to the main narrative. In addition, the description of Onegin's vision near the Odessa pier and rather sharply expressed judgments and remarks were removed from the structure of the novel. It was dangerous enough for Pushkin to leave this chapter - for these revolutionary views he could be arrested.

"Hero of our time". Short description

Lermontov began work on the work in 1838. His novel includes several parts. In the process of reading, you can see that the chronology is broken in the narrative. The author used this artistic technique for several reasons. Mainly, this structure of the work shows the main character - Pechorin - first through the eyes of Maxim Maksimych. Then the character appears before the reader according to the entries of his diary.

Brief Onegin and Pechorin

Both characters are representatives of the metropolitan aristocracy. Heroes received excellent Their level of intelligence is higher than the average level of the people around them. The characters are separated by ten years, but each of them is a representative of his era. Onegin's life takes place in the twenties, the action of Lermontov's novel takes place in the 30s of the 19th century. The first is under the influence of freedom-loving ideas in the heyday of an advanced social movement. Pechorin lives in a period of violent political reactions to the activities of the Decembrists. And if the first one could still join the rebels and find a goal, thus giving meaning to his own existence, then the second hero no longer had such an opportunity. This already speaks of the greater tragedy of Lermontov's character.

The main features of the character of the novel "A Hero of Our Time"

The image of Grigory Pechorin was one of the artistic discoveries of Lermontov. This hero is epochal mainly because the features of that post-Decembrist era were expressed in his image. Outwardly, this period is characterized only by losses, cruel reactions. Inside, active, uninterrupted, deaf and silent work was carried out.

It must be said that Pechorin is a rather extraordinary person, everything about him is debatable. For example, a hero may complain about a draft, and after a while, jump at the enemy with a saber drawn. Maxim Maksimych speaks of him as a person who is able to endure the difficulties of nomadic life, climate change. Grigory was slender, his height was average, his physique was strong with a thin frame and broad shoulders. According to Maxim Maksimych, the essence of Pechorin was not defeated either by the depravity of the life of the capital, or by mental torment.

What do the characters have in common?

Comparison of Onegin and Pechorin should begin with an analysis of the character traits of the characters. Both characters are very critical of people and life. Realizing the emptiness and monotony of their existence, they show dissatisfaction with themselves. They are oppressed by the surrounding situation and people, mired in slander and anger, envy.

Disappointed in society, the heroes fall into melancholy, begin to get bored. Onegin is trying to start writing to satisfy his spiritual needs. But his "hard work" quickly tires him. Reading also briefly fascinates him.

Pechorin also gets tired of any business he starts quite quickly. However, once in the Caucasus, Grigory still hopes that there will be no place for boredom under the bullets. But he gets used to military operations very quickly. Bored Lermontov's character and love adventures. This can be seen in and Bel. Having achieved love, Gregory quickly loses interest in ladies.

What else is the similarity between Pechorin and Onegin? Both characters are selfish by nature. They do not consider the feelings or opinions of other people.

Relationships of characters with others

Not wanting to lose his freedom, Onegin rejects Tatyana's feelings. Feeling his superiority over people in general, he accepts Lensky's challenge and kills a friend in a duel. Pechorin brings misfortune to almost everyone who surrounds him or meets him. So, he kills Grushnitsky, upsets Maxim Maksimych to the depths of his soul, destroys the lives of Vera, Mary, Bela. Gregory seeks the location and love of women, following only the desire to entertain himself. Dispelling boredom, he quickly cools off towards them. Pechorin is quite cruel. This quality of his is manifested even in relation to the sick Mary: he tells her that he never loved her, but only laughed at her.

The most striking features of the characters

A comparative description of Onegin and Pechorin would be incomplete without mentioning the self-criticism of the heroes. The first is tormented by remorse after the duel with Lensky. Onegin, unable to stay in the places where the tragedy happened, abandons everything and begins to wander around the world.

The hero of Lermontov's novel admits that he has caused quite a lot of grief to people throughout his life. But, despite this understanding, Pechorin is not going to change himself and his behavior. And Gregory's self-criticism does not bring relief to anyone - neither to himself, nor to those around him. Such an attitude towards life, himself, people portrays him as a "moral cripple."

Despite the differences between Pechorin and Onegin, both of them have many common features. Each of them has the ability to perfectly understand people. Both characters are good psychologists. So, Onegin singled out Tatyana immediately, at the first meeting. Of all the representatives of the local nobility, Eugene got along only with Lensky.

The hero of Lermontov also correctly judges the people who meet him on the way. Pechorin gives quite accurate and accurate characteristics to others. In addition, Gregory knows female psychology perfectly, can easily predict the actions of ladies and, using this, wins their love.

Comparative characteristics of Onegin and Pechorin allows you to see the true state of the inner worlds of the characters. In particular, despite all the misfortunes that each of them caused to people, both of them are capable of bright feelings.

Love in the lives of heroes

Realizing his love for Tatyana, Onegin is ready to do anything just to see her. Lermontov's hero immediately rushes after the departed Vera. Pechorin, not catching up with his beloved, falls in the middle of the path and cries like a child. Pushkin's hero is noble. Onegin is honest with Tatyana and does not think of taking advantage of her inexperience. In this Lermontov's hero is the direct opposite. Pechorin appears as an immoral person, a person for whom the people around him are just toys.

Ideals and values

The comparative characteristic of Onegin and Pechorin is mainly a comparison of the inner world of each character. The analysis of their behavior allows us to understand the motivation of certain actions. So, for example, the attitude of the heroes towards the duel is different. Onegin is fast asleep the night before. He doesn't take the duel seriously. However, after the death of Lensky, Evgeny is seized by horror and remorse.

Lermontov's hero, on the contrary, does not sleep all night before the duel with Grushnitsky. Gregory is immersed in reflection, he thinks about the purpose of his existence. At the same time, Pechorin will kill Grushnitsky quite cold-bloodedly. He calmly leaves the dueling area, bowing politely.

Why are Pechorin and Onegin "superfluous people"?

Society had a rather negative attitude towards the heroes. People around could not understand the behavior of the characters. The point of view, views and opinions of Pechorin and Onegin did not coincide with the generally accepted ones, therefore they were perceived with hostility. Both characters feel their loneliness in the light, among the crowd, feeling the superiority of these young people. In the images of Pechorin and Onegin, the authors protested against the vileness and mustiness of that time, depriving people of their goals, forcing them to waste their strength, not finding any use for their abilities or skills.

Collection of works: Similarities and differences between the images of Onegin and Pechorin

The images of Pechorin and Onegin are similar not only in semantic similarity. V. G. noted the spiritual kinship of Onegin and Pechorin: “Their dissimilarity among themselves is much less than the distance between Onega and Pechora ... Pechorin is the Onegin of our time.”

The novels "Eugene Onegin" and "A Hero of Our Time" were written at different times, and the duration of these works is different. Eugene lived in an era of rising national and social consciousness, freedom-loving sentiments, secret societies, and hopes for revolutionary transformations. Pechorin is the hero of an era of timelessness, a period of reaction, a decline in social activity. But the problems of both works are the same - the spiritual crisis of the noble intelligentsia, who critically perceive reality, but do not try to change, improve the structure of society. The intelligentsia, which is limited to a passive protest against the lack of spirituality of the surrounding world. The heroes withdrew into themselves, wasted their strength aimlessly, realized the meaninglessness of their existence, but did not possess either a social temperament, or social ideals, or the ability to sacrifice themselves.

Onegin and Pechorin were brought up in the same conditions, with the help of fashionable French tutors. Both received a fairly good education for those times, Onegin communicates with Lensky, talks on a wide variety of topics, which indicates his high education:

... Tribes of past treaties,

The fruits of science, good and evil,

And age-old prejudices

And fatal secrets of the coffin,

Fate and life...

Pechorin freely discusses with Dr. Werner the most complex problems of modern science, which testifies to the depth of his ideas about the world | and the breadth of interests.

However, both of them did not have the habit of independent systematic work - the habit of idleness [corrupted their souls. Onegin, “betrayed by idleness, (languishing with spiritual emptiness ... set up a shelf with a detachment of books, read, read, but all to no avail: there is boredom, there is deceit and delirium; there is no conscience, there is no point in that.” Pechorin took up the books just as zealously and just as easily left them: “I began to read, to study - the sciences were also tired.” The inability to purposeful, concentrated work on oneself, caused by the accessibility, ease of everything received from life, the lack of clear ideas about social ideals - all this led them to deny "empty light" and deep dissatisfaction with their lives.

But before the denial of secular pleasures, both heroes willingly indulged in them, not at all embarrassed by idle pastime. Both were very successful in "the science of tender passion, which Nason sang." Onegin was coldly prudent in a love game:

How could he be new?

Joking innocence to amaze

ready to scare with despair

To amuse with pleasant flattery ...

Pray and demand recognition

Listen to the first sound of the heart

Chase love, and suddenly

Get a secret date...

Also prudently, in full accordance with the secular rules of seduction, Pechorin treated women: “... getting to know a woman, I always accurately guessed whether she would love me ... I never became a slave of my beloved woman, on the contrary, I always acquired over their will and invincible power with my heart ... is that why I never really value anything ... "

However, in my opinion, Onegin is much softer, more humane than Pechorin. Realizing the vanity of secular life, he, having met a beautiful girl, nobly did not take advantage of the inexperience, sincerity of an inexperienced soul. Although “the language of girlish dreams in him swarmed thoughts,” Onegin, mentally devastated by social life, realizing that “there is no return to dreams and years,” delicately rejects Tatyana’s love: “I love you with the love of a brother and, perhaps, even more tenderly.”

Pechorin, on the other hand, shamelessly enjoys the love of Bela, who is infinitely devoted to him, provokes the love of Princess Mary, who is indifferent to him, in order to only annoy the empty and arrogant Grushnitsky and once again convince himself of his power over women. Ruthlessly trampling someone else's feeling, Pechorin no longer evokes compassion, but hostility.

Both characters are selfish and incapable of true friendship.

Onegin “sworn to infuriate Lensky and take revenge in order,” succumbing to a momentary impulse of spiritual weakness. He regrets the duel, realizes its senselessness, but cannot overcome the false idea of noble honor. “Having killed a friend in a duel,” Onegin suffers painfully and, restless, tries to escape from himself.

Pechorin, on the other hand, deliberately provokes Grushnitsky to a challenge, and almost does not regret the ruined life of an empty, vain, not very decent, but still quite harmless person. He admits: “I lied, but I wanted to beat him. I have an innate passion to contradict ... "

Subsequently, Onegin is capable of a real feeling. He punishes himself for being afraid of losing his "hateful freedom" and refusing great love:

I thought: liberty and peace Replacement for happiness.

My God! How wrong I was, how punished ...

Eugene is passionately and selflessly in love, and perceives Tatyana's refusal as a life tragedy, the collapse of his hopes for ordinary human happiness.

Pechorin is adamant, declaring: "... twenty times my life, I will even put my honor at stake, but I will not sell my freedom."

Both Onegin and Pechorin, wasting themselves in vain, suffer a failure in life. Not seeing social goals in front of them, they never find meaning in life. Both regret the ruined youth. These are thinking, suffering, albeit selfish heroes.

Onegin is hopelessly tired of life and exclaims:

Why am I not pierced by a bullet,

Why am I not a sickly old man? ..

Pechorin calls himself a "moral cripple", realizing that "my best qualities, fearing ridicule, I buried in the depths of my heart." Both heroes, we repeat, suffer a failure in life and both are aware of this. And yet Pechorin is more active, active, and Onegin is more humane, sympathetic. Pechorin seeks death and dies; Onegin with a restless soul joylessly looks into the future. The remarkable strengths of these heroes do not find any use for themselves, their suffering, selfishness does not allow them to open up to others, to devote their lives to society.

Introduction

I. The problem of the hero of time in Russian literature

II. Types of superfluous people in the novels of Pushkin and Lermontov

Spiritual drama of the Russian European Eugene Onegin
Pechorin is a hero of his time.
Similarities and differences between the images of Onegin and Pechorin

Literature

Introduction

The problem of the hero of time has always excited, worried and will excite people. It was staged by classical writers, it is relevant, and until now this problem has interested and worried me ever since I first discovered the works of Pushkin and Lermontov. That's why I decided to turn to this topic in my job. Pushkin's novel in verse "Eugene Onegin" and Lermontov's novel "A Hero of Our Time" are the pinnacles of Russian literature of the first half of the 19th century. In the center of these works are people who, in their development, are higher than the society around them, but who are not able to find application for their rich strengths and abilities. Therefore, such people are called "superfluous". And goal of my work to show the types of "superfluous people" on the images of Eugene Onegin and Grigory Pechorin, as they are the most characteristic representatives of their time. One of assignments, which I set myself - is to reveal the similarities and differences between Onegin and Pechorin, while referring to the articles of V. G. Belinsky.

I. The problem of the hero of time in Russian literature

Onegin is a typical figure for the noble youth of the 20s of the 19th century. Even in the poem "Prisoner of the Caucasus" A.S. Pushkin set himself the task of showing in the hero "that premature old age of the soul, which has become the main feature of the younger generation." But the poet, in his own words, did not cope with this task. In the novel "Eugene Onegin" this goal was achieved. The poet created a deeply typical image.

M.Yu. Lermontov is a writer of "a completely different era", despite the fact that a decade separates them from Pushkin.

Years of brutal reaction have taken their toll. In his era it was impossible to overcome the alienation from time, or rather from the timelessness of the 1930s.

Lermontov saw the tragedy of his generation. This is already reflected in the poem "Duma":

Sadly, I look at our generation!

His future is either empty or dark,

Meanwhile, under the burden of knowledge and doubt,

It will grow old in inaction...

This theme was continued by M.Yu. Lermontov in the novel "A Hero of Our Time". The novel "A Hero of Our Time" was written in 1838-1840 of the 19th century. It was the era of the most severe political reaction that came in the country after the defeat of the Decembrists. In his work, the author recreated in the image of Pechorin, the protagonist of the novel, a typical character of the 30s of the XIX century.

II. Types of superfluous people in the novels of Pushkin and Lermontov

In the first third of the 19th century, the concept of the "hero of time" was associated with the type of "superfluous person". She has undergone a number of transformations without losing the main essence, which is that the hero has always been the bearer of a spiritual idea, and Russia, as a purely material phenomenon, could not accept the best of her sons. This contradiction of spirit and life becomes decisive in the conflict between the hero and the motherland. Russia can offer the hero only a material field, a career, which does not interest him at all. Being cut off from material life, the hero cannot take root in his homeland in order to realize his lofty plans for its transformation, and this gives rise to his wandering, restlessness. The type of "superfluous person" in Russian literature goes back to the romantic hero. A characteristic feature of romantic behavior is a conscious orientation towards one or another literary type. A romantic young man necessarily associated himself with the name of some character from the mythology of romanticism: the Demon or Werther, the hero of Goethe, the young man who was tragically in love and committed suicide, Melmoth, the mysterious villain, the demonic seducer, or Ahasuerus, the Eternal Jew, who abused Christ during his ascent to Golgotha and for that cursed with immortality, Giaur or Don Juan - romantic rebels and wanderers from Byron's poems.

The deep meaning and characterization of the type of "superfluous person" for Russian society and Russian literature of the Nikolaev era was probably most accurately defined by A.I. Herzen, although this definition still remains in the "repositories" of literary criticism. Speaking about the essence of Onegin and Pechorin as "superfluous people" of the 20-30s of the 19th century, Herzen made a remarkably deep observation: "The sad type of superfluous ... person - only because he developed in a person, was then not only in poems and novels, but in the streets and living rooms, in villages and cities."

1. Spiritual drama of the Russian European Eugene Onegin

A. S. Pushkin's novel "Eugene Onegin" is perhaps the greatest work of the first half of the nineteenth century. This novel is one of the most beloved and at the same time the most complex works of Russian literature. Its action takes place in the 20s of the XIX century. The focus is on the life of the capital's nobility in the era of spiritual quest of the advanced noble intelligentsia.

Onegin is a contemporary of Pushkin and the Decembrists. The Onegins are not satisfied with secular life, the career of an official and a landowner. Belinsky points out that Onegin could not engage in useful activities "due to some inevitable circumstances beyond our will," that is, due to socio-political conditions. Onegin, the "suffering egoist", is nevertheless an outstanding personality. The poet notes such traits as "involuntary devotion to dreams, inimitable strangeness and a sharp, chilled mind." According to Belinsky, Onegin "was not from among ordinary people." Pushkin emphasizes that Onegin's boredom comes from the fact that he did not have a socially useful business. The Russian nobility of that time was an estate of land and soul owners. It was the possession of estates and serfs that was the measure of wealth, prestige and the height of social position. Onegin's father "gave three balls every year and finally squandered", and the hero of the novel himself, after receiving an inheritance from "all his relatives", became a rich landowner, he is now:

Factories, waters, forests, lands

The owner is complete...

But the theme of wealth turns out to be connected with ruin, the words "debts", "pledge", "lenders" are already found in the first lines of the novel. Debts, re-mortgaging already mortgaged estates were not only the work of poor landowners, but also many "powerful ones" left huge debts to their descendants. One of the reasons for the general debt was the idea that developed during the reign of Catherine II that "truly noble" behavior consists not just in big expenses, but in spending beyond one's means.

It was at that time, thanks to the penetration of various educational literature from abroad, that people began to understand the perniciousness of serf farming. Among these people was Eugene, he "read Adam Smith and was a deep economy." But, unfortunately, there were few such people, and most of them belonged to the youth. And therefore, when Eugene "with a yoke ... replaced the corvee with an old dues with a light one",

Puffed up in my corner

Seeing in this terrible harm,

His prudent neighbor.

The reason for the formation of debts was not only the desire to "live like a nobleman", but also the need to have free money at your disposal. This money was obtained by mortgaging estates. To live on the funds received when mortgaging the estate was called living in debt. It was assumed that the nobleman would improve his position with the money received, but in most cases the nobles lived on this money, spending it on the purchase or construction of houses in the capital, on balls ("gave three balls annually"). It was on this, habitual, but leading to ruin, that Father Evgeny went. Not surprisingly, when Onegin's father died, it turned out that the inheritance was burdened with large debts.

Gathered before Onegin

Lenders greedy regiment.

In this case, the heir could accept the inheritance and, together with it, take on the father's debts or refuse it, leaving the creditors to settle accounts among themselves. The first decision was dictated by a sense of honor, the desire not to tarnish the good name of the father or to preserve the family estate. The frivolous Onegin went the second way. Receipt of the inheritance was not the last means to correct the frustrated affairs. Youth, the time of hopes for an inheritance, was, as it were, a legalized period of debts, from which in the second half of life one had to be freed by becoming the heir to "all one's relatives" or by marrying favorably.

Who at twenty was a dandy or a grip,

And at thirty profitably married;

Who got free at fifty

From private and other debts.

For the nobles of that time, the military field seemed so natural that the absence of this feature in the biography had to have a special explanation. The fact that Onegin, as is clear from the novel, never served anywhere at all, made the young man a black sheep among his contemporaries. This reflected a new tradition. If earlier refusal to serve was denounced as selfishness, now it has acquired the contours of a struggle for personal independence, upholding the right to live independently of state requirements. Onegin leads the life of a young man, free from official duties. At that time, only rare young people, whose service was purely fictitious, could afford such a life. Let's take this detail. The order established by Paul I, in which all officials, including the emperor himself, had to go to bed early and get up early, was also preserved under Alexander I. But the right to get up as late as possible was a kind of sign of aristocracy that separated the non-serving nobleman not only from the common people, but also from village landowner. The fashion to get up as late as possible dates back to the French aristocracy of the "old pre-revolutionary regime" and was brought to Russia by emigrants.

Morning toilet and a cup of coffee or tea were replaced by two or three in the afternoon with a walk. The favorite places for the festivities of St. Petersburg dandies were Nevsky Prospekt and the English Embankment of the Neva, it was there that Onegin walked: "Having put on a wide bolivar, Onegin goes to the boulevard." . About four o'clock in the afternoon it was time for dinner. The young man, leading a single life, rarely kept a cook and preferred to dine in a restaurant.

In the afternoon, the young dandy sought to "kill" by filling the gap between the restaurant and the ball. The theater provided such an opportunity, it was not only a place for artistic spectacles and a kind of club where secular meetings took place, but also a place of love affairs:

The theater is already full; lodges shine;

Parterre and chairs - everything is in full swing;

In heaven they splash impatiently,

And, having risen, the curtain rustles.

Everything is clapping. Onegin enters,

Walks between the chairs on the legs,

Double lorgnette slanting induces

To the lodges of unknown ladies.

The ball had a dual property. On the one hand, it was an area of easy communication, secular recreation, a place where socio-economic differences were weakened. On the other hand, the ball was a place of representation of various social strata.

Tired of city life, Onegin settles in the countryside. An important event in his life was friendship with Lensky. Although Pushkin notes that they agreed "from doing nothing." This eventually led to a duel.

At that time, people looked at the duel in different ways. Some believed that a duel, in spite of everything, is a murder, which means barbarism, in which there is nothing chivalrous. Others - that a duel is a means of protecting human dignity, since in the face of a duel both a poor nobleman and a favorite of the court turned out to be equal.

This view was not alien to Pushkin, as his biography shows. The duel implied the strict observance of the rules, which was achieved by appealing to the authority of experts. Zaretsky plays such a role in the novel. He, "a classic and a pedant in duels", conducted his business with great omissions, or rather, deliberately ignoring everything that could eliminate the bloody outcome. Even at the first visit, he was obliged to discuss the possibility of reconciliation. This was part of his duties as a second, especially since no blood offense was inflicted and it was clear to everyone except 18-year-old Lensky that the matter was a misunderstanding. Onegin and Zaretsky break the duel rules. The first is to demonstrate his irritated contempt for the story, into which he fell against his will, the seriousness of which he still does not believe, and Zaretsky because he sees in a duel an amusing story, an object of gossip and practical jokes. Onegin's behavior in the duel irrefutably testifies that the author wanted to make him an unwilling killer. Onegin shoots from a long distance, taking only four steps, and the first, obviously not wanting to hit Lensky. However, the question arises: why, after all, did Onegin shoot at Lensky, and not past? The main mechanism by which the society, despised by Onegin, still powerfully controls his actions, is the fear of being ridiculous or becoming the subject of gossip. In the Onegin era, ineffective duels evoked an ironic attitude. A person who went to the barrier had to show an extraordinary spiritual will in order to maintain his behavior, and not accept the norms imposed on him. Onegin's behavior was determined by the fluctuations between the feelings that he had for Lensky and the fear of appearing ridiculous or cowardly, violating the rules of conduct in a duel. What won us, we know:

Poet, pensive dreamer

Killed by a friendly hand!

Thus, we can say that the drama of Onegin lies in the fact that he replaced real human feelings, love, faith with rational ideals. But a person is not able to live a full life without experiencing the play of passions, without making mistakes, because the mind cannot replace or subdue the soul. In order for the human personality to develop harmoniously, spiritual ideals must still come first.

The novel "Eugene Onegin" is an inexhaustible source that tells about the customs and life of that time. Onegin himself is a true hero of his time, and in order to understand him and his actions, we study the time in which he lived.

The protagonist of the novel "Eugene Onegin" opens a significant chapter in poetry and in all Russian culture. Onegin was followed by a whole string of heroes, later called "superfluous people": Lermontov's Pechorin, Turgenev's Rudin and many other, less significant characters, embodying a whole layer, an era in the socio-spiritual development of Russian society.

2. Pechorin is a hero of his time

Pechorin is an educated secular person with a critical mind, dissatisfied with life and not seeing an opportunity for himself to be happy. It continues the gallery of "superfluous people" opened by Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. Belinsky noted that the idea to portray the hero of his time in the novel does not belong exclusively to Lermontov, since at that moment Karamzin's “Knight of Our Time” already existed. Belinsky also pointed out that many writers of the early 19th century had such an idea.

Pechorin is called a “strange person” in the novel, as almost all other characters say about him. The definition of “strange” takes on the shade of a term, followed by a certain type of character and personality type, and is broader and more capacious than the definition of “an extra person”. There were such “strange people” before Pechorin, for example, in the story “A Walk in Moscow” and in Ryleev’s “Essay on an Eccentric”.

Lermontov, creating the “Hero of Our Time”, said that it was “fun” for him to draw a portrait of a modern person the way he understands him and met us then. Unlike Pushkin, he focuses on the inner world of his characters and argues in the “Preface to Pechorin’s Journal” that “the history of the human soul, even the smallest soul, is almost more interesting and not more useful than the history of a whole people.” The desire to reveal the inner world of the hero was also reflected in the composition: the novel begins, as it were, from the middle of the story and is consistently brought to the end of Pechorin's life. Thus, the reader knows in advance that Pechorin's "frantic race" for life is doomed to failure. Pechorin follows the path that his romantic predecessors took, thus showing the failure of their romantic ideals.

Pechorin is a hero of the transitional period, a representative of the noble youth, who entered life after the defeat of the Decembrists. The absence of high social ideals is a striking feature of this historical period. The image of Pechorin is one of the main artistic discoveries of Lermontov. The Pechorin type is truly epochal. In it, the fundamental features of the post-Decembrist era received their concentrated artistic expression, in which, according to Herzen, "only losses are visible on the surface", while inside "great work was being done .... deaf and silent, but active and uninterrupted ". This striking discrepancy between the internal and the external, and at the same time the conditionality of the intensive development of spiritual life, is captured in the image - the type of Pechorin. However, his image is much broader than what is contained in him in the universal, national - in the world, socio-psychological in the moral and philosophical. Pechorin in his journal repeatedly speaks of his contradictory duality. Usually this duality is considered as a result of the secular education received by Pechorin, the destructive influence of the noble-aristocratic sphere on him, and the transitional nature of his era.

Explaining the purpose of creating the "Hero of Our Time", M.Yu. Lermontov, in the preface to it, quite clearly makes it clear what the image of the protagonist is for him: "The hero of our time, my dear sirs, is like a portrait, but not of one person: this is a portrait made up of the vices of our entire generation, in their full development" . The author has set himself an important and difficult task, wishing to display the hero of his time on the pages of his novel. And here we have Pechorin - a truly tragic person, a young man suffering from his restlessness, in despair asking himself a painful question: "Why did I live? For what purpose was I born?" In the image of Lermontov, Pechorin is a man of a very specific time, position, socio-cultural environment, with all the contradictions that follow from this, which are investigated by the author in full artistic objectivity. This is a nobleman - an intellectual of the Nikolaev era, its victim and hero in one person, whose "soul is corrupted by light." But there is something more in him, which makes him a representative of not only a certain era and social environment. The personality of Pechorin appears in Lermontov's novel as unique - an individual manifestation in it of the concrete historical and universal, specific and generic. Pechorin differs from his predecessor Onegin not only in temperament, depth of thought and feeling, willpower, but also in the degree of self-awareness, his attitude to the world. Pechorin, to a greater extent than Onegin, is a thinker, an ideologist. He is organically philosophical. And in this sense, he is the most characteristic phenomenon of his time, according to Belinsky, "the age of the philosophizing spirit." Pechorin's intense thoughts, his constant analysis and introspection in their meaning go beyond the era that gave birth to him, they also have universal significance as a necessary stage in the self-construction of a person, in the formation of an individually-generic, that is, personal, beginning in him.

In the indomitable effectiveness of Pechorin, another important side of Lermontov's concept of man was reflected - as a being not only rational, but also active.

Pechorin embodies such qualities as a developed consciousness and self-awareness, "fullness of feelings and depth of thoughts", the perception of oneself as a representative not only of the current society, but of the entire history of mankind, spiritual and moral freedom, active self-affirmation of an integral being, etc. But, being the son of his time and society, he bears on himself their indelible stamp, which is reflected in the specific, limited, and sometimes distorted manifestation of the generic in him. In Pechorin's personality, there is a contradiction between his human essence and existence, which is especially characteristic of a socially unsettled society, according to Belinsky, "between the depth of nature and the pitiful actions of one and the same person." However, Pechorin's life position and activities make more sense than it seems at first glance. The seal of masculinity, even heroism, marks his unstoppable denial of reality unacceptable to him; in protest against which he relies only on his own strength. He dies in nothing, without giving up his principles and convictions, although without doing what he could do in other conditions. Deprived of the possibility of direct public action, Pechorin strives, nevertheless, to resist circumstances, to assert his will, his "own need", contrary to the prevailing "state need".

Lermontov, for the first time in Russian literature, brought to the pages of his novel a hero who directly set himself the most important, "last" questions of human existence - about the purpose and meaning of human life, about his appointment. On the night before the duel with Grushnitsky, he reflects: “I run through my memory of all my past and involuntarily ask myself: why did I live? For what purpose was I born? my strength is immense; but I did not guess this destination. I was carried away by the baits of empty and ungrateful passions; from their crucible I came out hard and cold as iron, but I lost forever the ardor of noble aspirations, the best color of life. Bela becomes a victim of Pechorin's self-will, forcibly torn from her environment, from the natural course of her life. Beautiful in its naturalness, but fragile and short-lived harmony of inexperience and ignorance, doomed to inevitable death in contact with reality, even if it is "natural" life, and even more so with the "civilization" invading it more and more powerfully, has been destroyed.

During the Renaissance, individualism was a historically progressive phenomenon. With the development of bourgeois relations, individualism loses its humanistic basis. In Russia, the deepening crisis of the feudal-serf system, the emergence in its depths of new, bourgeois relations, the victory in the Patriotic War of 1812 caused a truly renaissance upsurge in the feeling of the individual. But at the same time, all this is intertwined in the first third of the 19th century with the crisis of noble revolutionism (the events of December 14, 1825), with the fall in the authority of not only religious beliefs, but also enlightenment ideas, which ultimately created a fertile ground for the development of individualistic ideology in Russian society. In 1842, Belinsky stated: "Our century ... is a century ... of separation, individuality, an age of personal passions and interests (even mental ones) ...". Pechorin, with his total individualism, is an epoch-making figure in this regard. Pechorin's fundamental denial of the morality of his contemporary society, as well as his other foundations, was not only his personal merit. It has long matured in the public atmosphere, Pechorin was only its earliest and most vivid spokesman.

Another thing is also significant: Pechorin's individualism is far from pragmatic egoism adapting to life. In this sense, it is significant to compare the individualism of, say, Pushkin's Herman from The Queen of Spades with the individualism of Pechorin. Herman's individualism is based on the desire to win a place under the sun at all costs, that is, to climb to the top rungs of the social ladder. He rebels not against this unjust society, but against his humble position in it, which, as he believes, does not correspond to his inner significance, his intellectual and volitional capabilities. For the sake of winning a prestigious position in this unjust society, he is ready to do anything: step over, "transgress" not only through the fate of other people, but also through himself as an "inner" person. "Pechorin's individualism is not like that. The hero is full of truly rebellious rejection of all the foundations of society he is forced to live in. He is least of all concerned about his position in it. More than that, in fact, he has, and could easily have even more of what Herman is trying to achieve: he is rich, noble, all the doors of higher education are open to him. light, all roads on the way to a brilliant career, honors.He rejects all this as purely external tinsel, unworthy of the aspirations living in him for the true fullness of life, which he sees, in his words, in "the fullness and depth of feelings and thoughts," he considers his conscious individualism as something forced, since he has not yet found an alternative acceptable to him.

There is another feature in the character of Pechorin, which makes in many ways to take a fresh look at the individualism he professed. One of the dominant internal needs of the hero is his pronounced desire to communicate with people, which in itself contradicts individualistic worldviews. In Pechorin, the constant curiosity for life, for the world, and most importantly, for people, is striking.

Pechorin, it is said in the preface to the novel, is the type of "modern man" as the author "understands him" and as he has met him too often.

3. Similarities and differences between the images of Onegin and Pechorin

The novels "Eugene Onegin" and "A Hero of Our Time" were written at different times, and the duration of these works is different. Eugene lived in an era of rising national and social consciousness, freedom-loving sentiments, secret societies, and hopes for revolutionary transformations. Grigory Pechorin is the hero of an era of timelessness, a period of reaction, a decline in social activity. But the problems of both works are the same - the spiritual crisis of the noble intelligentsia, critically perceiving reality, but not trying to change, improve the structure of society. The intelligentsia, which is limited to a passive protest against the lack of spirituality of the surrounding world. The heroes withdrew into themselves, wasted their strength aimlessly, realized the meaninglessness of their existence, but did not possess either a social temperament, or social ideals, or the ability to sacrifice themselves.

Tribes of past treaties,

The fruits of science, good and evil,

And age-old prejudices

And fatal secrets of the coffin,

Fate and life...

Pechorin freely discusses with Dr. Werner the most complex problems of modern science, which testifies to the depth of his ideas about the world.

The parallelism between Onegin and Pechorin is obvious to the point of triviality, Lermontov's novel intersects with Pushkin's not only due to the main characters - their correlation is supported by numerous reminiscences. Many considerations could be given regarding the reflection of the antithesis Onegin - Lensky in the Pechorin - Grushnitsky pair (it is significant that back in 1837 Mr. Lermontov was inclined to identify Lensky with Pushkin); about the transformation of the narrative principles of Onegin in the system of A Hero of Our Time, which reveals a clear continuity between these novels, etc. Pechorin, repeatedly considered from Belinsky and Ap. Grigoriev to the works of Soviet Lermontov scholars. It is interesting to try to reconstruct on the basis of the figure of Pechorin how Lermontov interpreted the Onegin type, how he saw Onegin.

The principle of self-understanding of heroes through the prism of literary clichés, characteristic of Onegin, is actively used in A Hero of Our Time. Grushnitsky's goal is "to become the hero of the novel"; Princess Mary strives "not to get out of her accepted role"; Werner informs Pechorin: "In her imagination, you have become the hero of a novel in a new taste." In Onegin, literary self-understanding is a sign of naivety, belonging to a childish and untrue outlook on life. As they mature spiritually, the heroes are freed from literary glasses and in the eighth chapter they no longer appear as literary images of famous novels and poems, but as people, which is much more serious, deeper and more tragic.

In A Hero of Our Time, the emphasis is different. Heroes outside the literary self-coding - characters like Bela, Maxim Maksimovich or smugglers - are ordinary people. As for the characters of the opposite row, all of them - both high and low - are encoded by the literary tradition. The only difference is that Grushnitsky is the character of Marlinsky in real life, while Pechorin is encoded with the Onegin type.

In a realistic text, a traditionally coded image is placed in a space that is fundamentally alien to it and, as it were, extra-literary space (“a genius chained to a desk”). The result of this is a shift in plot situations. The self-perception of the hero turns out to be in contradiction with those surrounding contexts that are given as adequate to reality. A vivid example of such a transformation of the image is the relationship between the hero and plot situations in Don Quixote. Titles like "Knight of Our Time" or "Hero of Our Time" throw the reader into the same conflict.

Pechorin is encoded in the image of Onegin, but that is why he is not Onegin, but his interpretation. Being Onegin is a role for Pechorin. Onegin is not an "extra person" - this definition itself, just like Herzen's "smart uselessness", appeared later and is some kind of interpretive projection of Onegin. Onegin of the eighth chapter does not think of himself as a literary character. Meanwhile, if the political essence of the “superfluous person” was revealed by Herzen, and the social essence by Dobrolyubov, then the historical psychology of this type is inseparable from experiencing oneself as the “hero of the novel”, and one’s life as the realization of some plot. Such self-determination inevitably raises the question of man's "fifth act" - the apotheosis or death that completes the play of life or its human novel. The theme of death, the end, the “fifth act”, the finale of his novel becomes one of the main ones in the psychological self-determination of a person of the romantic era. Just as a literary character "lives" for the sake of the final scene or the last exclamation, so the man of the Romantic era lives "for the sake of the end." “We will die, brothers, oh, how glorious we will die!” - A. Odoevsky exclaimed, going out on December 14, 1825 to Senate Square.

The psychology of the “superfluous person” is the psychology of a person whose entire life role was aimed at death and who, nevertheless, did not die. The novel plot catches the “superfluous person” after the end of the fifth act of his life play, devoid of a scenario for further behavior. For the generation of Lermontov's "Duma" the concept of the fifth act is still filled with historically real content - this is December 14th. In the future, it turns into a conditional point of the plot reference. Naturally, activity after activity turns into continuous inactivity. Lermontov very clearly revealed the connection between the failed death and the aimlessness of further existence, forcing Pechorin in the middle of "Princess Mary" to say goodbye to life, settle all accounts with her and ... not die. “And now I feel that I still have a long time to live.” L. N. Tolstoy later showed how this literary situation becomes a program of real behavior, doubling again (a romantic hero as a certain program of behavior, being realized in the real actions of a Russian nobleman, becomes an “extra person”; in turn, an “extra person” becomes , having become a fact of literature, a program for the behavior of a certain part of the Russian nobles.

III. "Eugene Onegin" and "Hero of Our Time" - the best artistic documents of their era

What a short time separates Pushkin's Onegin and Lermontov's Pechorin! First quarter and forties of the 19th century. And yet these are two different eras, separated by an unforgettable event in Russian history - the uprising of the Decembrists. Pushkin and Lermontov managed to create works that reflect the spirit of these eras, works that touched upon the problems of the fate of the young noble intelligentsia, who were unable to find application for their forces.

According to Belinsky, "A Hero of Our Time" is "a sad thought about our time," and Pechorin is "a hero of our time. Their dissimilarity among themselves is much less than the distance between Onega and Pechora."

"Eugene Onegin" and "A Hero of Our Time" are vivid artistic documents of their era, and their main characters personify for us all the futility of trying to live in society and be free from it.

Conclusion

So, we have two heroes, both representatives of their difficult time. The remarkable critic V.G. Belinsky did not put an "equal" sign between them, but he did not see a big gap between them either.

Calling Pechorin the Onegin of his time, Belinsky paid tribute to the unsurpassed artistry of Pushkin's image and at the same time believed that "Pechorin is superior to Onegin in theory", although, as if muffling some categoricalness of this assessment, he added: "However, this advantage belongs to our time, and not Lermontov". Starting from the 2nd half of the 19th century, the definition of "an extra person" was strengthened for Pechorin.

The deep meaning and characterization of the type of "superfluous person" for Russian society and Russian literature of the Nikolaev era was probably most accurately defined by A.I. Herzen, although this definition still remains in the "repositories" of literary criticism. Speaking about the essence of Onegin and Pechorin as "superfluous people" of the 1820s and 30s, Herzen made a remarkably deep observation: "The sad type of superfluous ... person - only because he developed in a person, was then not only in poems and novels but in the streets and living rooms, in villages and cities.

And yet, with all his closeness to Onegin, Pechorin, as a hero of his time, marks a completely new stage in the development of Russian society and Russian literature. If Onegin reflects the painful, but in many ways semi-spontaneous process of turning an aristocrat, a "dandy" into a person, becoming a personality in him, then Pechorin captures the tragedy of an already established highly developed personality, doomed to live in a noble-serf society under an autocratic regime.

Literature

Demin N.A. The study of the work of A.S. Pushkin in the 8th grade. - Moscow, "Enlightenment", 1971
Lermontov M.Yu. Hero of our time. - Moscow: "Soviet Russia", 1981
Lermontov M.Yu. Works. Moscow, publishing house "Pravda", 1988
Pushkin A.S. "Eugene Onegin", Moscow: Fiction, 1984
Udodov B.T. Roman M.Yu. Lermontov "Hero of Our Time", Moscow, "Enlightenment", 1989
Manuilov V.A. Roman M.Yu. Lermontov "A Hero of Our Time" Commentary. - Leningrad: "Enlightenment", 1975
Shatalov S.E. Heroes of the novel by A.S. Pushkin "Eugene Onegin". - M.: "Enlightenment", 1986
Gershtein E. "A Hero of Our Time" M.Yu. Lermontov. - M.: Fiction, 1976
Lermontov Encyclopedia - M.: Sov. encyclopedia, 1981
Belinsky V. G. Articles about Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol - M .: Education, 1983
Viskovatov P. A. Mikhail Yurievich Lermontov: Life and work - M .: Book, 1989
Nabokov V. V. Comments on "Eugene Onegin" by Alexander Pushkin - M .: NPK "Intelvak", 1999
Lotman Yu. M. Roman A.S. Pushkin "Eugene Onegin": Commentary: A guide for the teacher. - L .: Education., 1980
Pushkin A. S. Favorites - M .: Education, 1983

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In the literature of every nation there are works whose heroes, positive or negative, a person remembers all his life, and there are characters that are erased from human memory over time. If we talk about Russian literature, then the works of M. Yu. Lermontov "A Hero of Our Time" and A. S. and "Eugene Onegin" are outstanding novels, the main characters of which Grigory Pechorin and Eugene Onegin remain in our memory until the end of their lives. These are rather controversial characters with bright characters, which everyone knows who is at least a little familiar with Russian literature.

The heroes of the novels of A. S. and M. Yu. Lermontov share less than ten years. If they were real people, they could easily meet at a reception in one of the drawing rooms, at one of the balls, or in the box of one of the beauties at the premiere of some performance.

However, let's try to figure out what is more in Onegin and Pechorin - differences or similarities. After all, differences in characters, lifestyle and behavior sometimes separate people more than a whole century.

From the first chapter of the novel, Eugene Onegin appears before us in the form of an established secular young man, no worse and no better than his other contemporaries. A good home education, a solid inheritance, an easy and pleasant mind, a secular gloss, the ability to gracefully express themselves and find a common language with anyone. In addition to this, a thorough knowledge of fashion issues and the ability to organize bachelor dinners - that's all that Eugene Onegin lives for. A. S. describes in detail one day in the life of Onegin - getting up, breakfast, toilet, dinner, theater and sleep. And this description is quite enough, because Onegin's life passed calmly and evenly, and each new day was similar to the previous one.

"Until the morning his life is ready,

Monotonous and variegated

And tomorrow is the same as yesterday...

Such a regularity of his life, the repetition of the same thing, hidden behind external diversity and brightness, is a senseless waste of time, a void in which the hero of the novel does not realize himself. He tries to give all his life force to women, but where there is no love, passion very quickly turns into a habit.

Only a little revives Onegin's move to the village, he tries to change something there, to put progressive knowledge into practice, but nothing comes of it and he soon becomes discouraged. However, the sky character is still different from his peers, from the typical playboys with whom secular society was then filled. He has

"Dreams of involuntary devotion,

inimitable oddity

and a sharp, chilled mind."

Looking closely at Onegin, you can see that this is an outstanding personality with the makings of a strong person with a bright character, who is confined within the boundaries of the givens of that time and who lacks the strength, but rather lacks the desire to escape from there. All his aspirations are impulsive, he does not understand that only "hard work" will allow him to build a real life. Being led by easy decisions, he unwittingly becomes a seducer and a murderer. But at the same time, the decency and nobility that he shows to Tatiana are somewhat encouraging and make you believe that Onegin, although he leads an empty life, is not empty in his soul. And the poet gives him a chance for resurrection. Onegin wakes up everything human thanks to true love, which showed him that there is truth on earth, and what remains a lie. We part with Onegin, seeing him not yet revived, but still not fallen and not lost. gives us the opportunity to think for ourselves whether Onegin will become a spiritually rich person and whether he will truly live, or will remain until the end of his days a soulless burner of life.

As for Grigory Pechorin, he is somewhat younger than Onegin. He is young and very fresh - this is how Lermontov presents him to us. He is very good and stands out in the surrounding society. But already from the first minutes of acquaintance with this character, we see his endless fatigue and lethargy, inherent only in old people who have lived a long and difficult life. And if the author of the novel talks about Onegin, then we learn more about Pechorin from his diary. We do not know anything about his childhood and youth. But having matured, he became a man who soberly assesses his strengths and weaknesses, his strengths and weaknesses. Pechorin knows, but rather feels, that “after all, it’s true that I had a great appointment, because I feel immense strength in my soul.” However, he wasted his strength, his life energy in vain, "he was carried away by the lure of empty and ungrateful passions." And if Onegin is looking for the meaning of life, then Pechorin is sure that it does not exist. The strength of his personality, his influence on others is so great that he can easily control situations and people, he can easily get whatever he wants. But having received what he wants, he instantly cools down, realizing that he needs something completely different. Such impulsiveness of Pechorin is very similar to the behavior and actions of Onegin.

Pechorin is not afraid of death, he is indifferent to life. And if Onegin, having become an unwitting killer, was dejected and shocked, then Pechorin is an amazingly cold-blooded killer, for whom people are nothing more than shadows. You can very easily hurt his pride, but not his soul and heart, because Pechorin believes that his soul is dead. Two times, two heroes who are very similar to each other. But if they had a chance to meet, then, despite their similarities, they would rather become enemies than turn into friends. Each of them is looking for the meaning of life, but they are looking for it alone, neglecting other people and not seeing the world around them.

"Their dissimilarity among themselves is much less than the distance between Onega and Pechora ... Pechorin is the Onegin of our time."

V. G. Belinsky.

Onegin and Pechorin are representatives of a certain historical era. In their deeds and deeds, the authors reflected the strength and weakness of their generation. Each of them is a hero of his time. It was time that determined not only their common features, but also their differences.

The similarity of the images of Eugene Onegin and Grigory Pechorin is indisputable. Origin, conditions of upbringing, education, formation of characters - all this is common to our heroes.

They were well-read and educated people, which put them above the rest of the young people of their circle. Onegin is a capital aristocrat with a rich inheritance. This is a very complex and contradictory person. He is talented, smart and educated. Evidence of Onegin's high education is his extensive personal library.

Pechorin is a representative of the noble youth, a strong personality, there is a lot of exceptional, special in him: an outstanding mind, extraordinary willpower. Possessing significant abilities, spiritual needs, both failed to realize themselves in life.

In their youth, both heroes were fond of carefree secular life, both succeeded in the "science of tender passion", in the knowledge of "Russian young ladies". Pechorin says that when he met a woman, he always accurately guessed whether she would love him. It only brings misfortune to women. And Onegin left a not too good mark on Tatyana's life, not immediately sharing her feelings.

Both heroes go through misfortunes, both become the perpetrators of the death of people. Both Onegin and Pechorin value their freedom. The indifference to people characteristic of both, disappointment and boredom affect their attitude towards friendship. Onegin is friends with Lensky because there is nothing to do. And Pechorin says that he is not capable of friendship, and demonstrates this in his cold attitude towards Maxim Maksimych.

It becomes clear that there are differences between the heroes of Pushkin's and Lermontov's novels. Onegin is an egoist, which, in principle, is not his fault. The father almost did not pay attention to him, giving his son to tutors, who only praised the guy. So he grew up into a person who cared only about himself, about his desires, not paying attention to the feelings and suffering of other people. Onegin is not satisfied with the career of an official and a landowner. He never served at all, which distinguishes him from his contemporaries. Onegin leads a life free from official duties.

Pechorin is a suffering egoist. He understands the insignificance of his position. Pechorin considers himself one of their pitiful descendants who roam the earth without pride or conviction. Lack of faith in heroism, love and friendship deprive his life of values. He does not know why he was born and why he lives. Pechorin differs from his predecessor Onegin not only in temperament, willpower, but also in the degree of his attitude to the world. Unlike Onegin, he is not just smart, he is a philosopher and thinker.

Both Onegin and Pechorin, disappointed in the life around them, go to a duel. However, everyone has their own reason. Onegin is afraid of public opinion, accepting Lensky's challenge to a duel. Pechorin, shooting with Grushnitsky, takes revenge on society for unfulfilled hopes.

Fate sends Lermontov's hero test after test, he himself is looking for adventure, which is important. It attracts him, he just lives in adventure. Onegin, on the other hand, accepts life as it is, goes with the flow. He is a child of his era, spoiled, capricious, but obedient. Pechorin's disobedience is his death. Both Onegin and Pechorin are selfish, but thinking and suffering heroes. Because by hurting other people, they suffer no less.

Comparing the description of the life of the heroes, one can be convinced that Pechorin is a more active person. Onegin, as a person, remains a mystery to us.

But for us, these heroes remain interesting and important, as holders of high human dignity.